In order to be fully functional, many cellular receptors and other membrane proteins require interactions with cholesterol within the lipid bilayer. Therefore, when reconstituting these proteins for in vitro biochemical and structural studies, it is desirable to mimic the native bilayer as closely as possible. This can be accomplished by adding the appropriate lipids and cholesterol to micelle-solubilized membrane protein preparations. One obstacle however, is that cholesterol is notoriously difficult to solubilize under the micellar conditions typically used for membrane protein solubilization. In the present invention, four novel water soluble cholesterol analogs are disclosed which have various applications in studies of membrane proteins.